About Me

I'm a semi-retired professional man, living in the Midwestern United States. This blog is a personal blog and is not directly connected with my professional practice (although I may draw upon my professional experiences, as well as my personal experiences, in writing my blog posts). This is a place for personal, not professional, opinions.

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06/08/2018

Remembering To Forget

Although James V. Schall, S.J., may be officially retired from his academic positions of teaching theology and philosophy, his mind remains active and as insightful as ever. His recent essay for The Catholic Thingon Samuel Johnson and the power of "forgetfulness" was full of so many pearls that it merits many re-readings.

Fleeting memories of past events can, unbidden, repeatedly resurface to distract us from more important thoughts and activities. True, not all memories are useless, and even memories that cause regret can be valuable. However, as is the case with other impulses that assault us, the key to virtuous behavior is in our mastery of these memories.

All human acts and choices that have taken place in the past are set forever. They will not change, though they do contain the lesson of their causes. However, “the business of life is forwards.” Still, we can study and learn from past evils.

“That which is feared may sometimes be avoided, but that which is regretted today may also be regretted tomorrow.” Johnson proceeded from memory, to forgiveness, to worry about the future, then to regret about the past. The past is not totally inert in our lives. We can look at it, see the goods and evils that did happen.

We can regret. Basic to forgiveness is to acknowledge that something is disordered/sinful, that something needs to be forgiven. We cannot be merciful to what needs no regret.

“But a very small part of the moments spent in meditation,” Johnson warned, “produce any reasonable caution or salutary sorrow.” Those moments that do produce such sorrow are indeed potentially salvific. However:

most of the mortifications we have suffered, arose from the concurrence of local and temporary circumstances, which can never meet again; and most of our disappointments have succeeded those expectations, which life allows not to be formed a second time.

Most things happen but once. All “second times” are also different.

Fr. Schall then asks "What can we do about this situation?" According to Johnson, we will never be able to completely eradicate such memories and regrets, but those of us who devote our efforts to the task may achieve a measure of success.

Our leisure should not be spent worrying about things we can do nothing about.

“But to forget or to remember at pleasure, are equally beyond the power of man.” Johnson remained a realist. We will always be bothered to some degree by temptations and meandering thoughts. Work on improving memory can be helpful.

In words that could have been written by Aristotle, Johnson continues: “Reason will, by a resolute contest, prevail over imagination, and the power may be obtained of transferring the attention as judgment shall suggest.” The power to think clearly allows us to choose and give full attention to what we judge worthy of our contemplation.

Fr. Schall's reference to Aristotle is apt. As I touched upon in a post six years ago, Aristotle taught that "training and habituation" are the path to "excellence" or "acting rightly." "We are what we repeatedly do." Johnson and Schall advise us through reason and will to do our best to train our minds to habitually ignore the unproductive and focus on the productive. The battle will never end, but should not be fruitless. Moreover, while starting young makes the task of training and habituation easier, it is never too late to start.

Fr. Schall concludes with some "wise words" to those of us who dwell too much in a past that we cannot change and/or in a future that has not--and may never--occur. Those words are essentially, "Get Busy!"

Johnson’s final words are these: “The gloomy and resentful are always found among those who have nothing to do, or who do nothing. We must be busy about good or evil, and he to whom the present offers nothing will often be looking backwards on the past.”

The gloomy and resentful either have nothing to do, or do nothing. Such wise words probably ought not to be forgotten.